‘I don’t want to stick out like a weed in a feild of wildflowers.” Is a saying I have heard one to many times, a saying my grandmother used to try telling me as if it was some kind of rhyme. I used to believe it, I used to think that it was true. I hated being different, so I decided to try something new. I began following trends, and all the latest fads.

I’d straighten my hair everyday, making my mother mad. Her ‘curly girl’ was unrecognizable, and it wasn’t just a tad. I was so set on blending in, not to disturb the motion or the flow of anyone else’s perfect notion. However that wasn’t me, it wasn’t who I wanted to be. It wasn’t my usual commotion.

I began to be looked at weird, or berated by others. Laughed at and mocked, that I wanted to be someone I clearly was not. I grew sad, the girl I once knew was fading. This imposter of me was taking over, the very one I was creating. I couldn’t take it anymore, pointed at and ‘booed’. I decided it was time, time for me to take action.

It started off slow, barely noticeable by not even a fraction. I began doing things that weren’t the latest fashion. I started dressing like me again, reinventing myself back to who I really was. I was the ‘weird brown girl’, who’s hair was once compared to ‘fuzz’.

I fell out of the mold, shattered like a freshly sculpted vase. I started to show who I really was, not hide behind my fake face. I embraced myself with open arms, no longer embarrassed that I looked out of place. I became the weed my grandmother once told me of, something I could no longer erase.

So, I’m proud to be different. I’m proud being free. I’m proud to be a ‘weed in a field of wildflowers’. I’m proud to be me.